Eddie Parker - I'm Gone

This is a piece of classic 1960s Detroit which epitomised the early days of Blackpool Mecca, championed by Tony Jebb back in the very early days of the Highland Room, way back in 1971 and 1972, prior to the Torch opening. It still sounds great but has been much forgotten and neglected over the years, and in the early 1970s was way overshadowed by Eddie's other Northern Soul monster, "Love You Baby", on the Ashford label. In recent years though, "I'm Gone" has become one of the scene's most sought after records. It was a piece of Motownesque joyful exuberance on the Awake label, owned by one of Motown's legendary Funk Brothers, Jack Ashford, from 1967, that golden year, and as fine a piece of Northern Soul as you could ever wish to hear. And the very quintessence of the mid Sixties. We recut it in 1999 when we were filming our marathon six disc, twenty four hour massive documentary about the entire history of the Northern Soul scene, which contained 131 specially recorded performances of all the classics, and is still available on a six disc box set now. So, we tracked down Eddie Parker in Detroit, via Lorraine Chandler, and filmed him, and he was more than happy to make this one and only one-time performance especially for us, for our ground breaking Encyclopaedia Britannica of Northern Soul, and I am so glad that we did.